AN ESSENTIAL UNDERSTANDING OF WOOD AND ITS PROPERTIES

Everyone knows that wood is derived from living trees. What people often fail to consider, however, is that wood is also substantially composed of water. This has some important consequences: principally, that it will expand and contract when subjected to environmental changes in temperature and humidity. Unequal stresses within sawn timber will cause otherwise flat planks to expand, contract and exhibit curved distortion. The degree to which wood planks move once they have been installed is entirely determined by the type and construction of the planks. Only a correctly engineered wide-plank wood floor can offer complete stability.

Non-Engineered Solid Wood

Many people are attracted by the idea of having a non-engineered solid wood floor, it is after all the grandfather of wood flooring. The difficulties consequent upon such a choice are myriad. Non-engineered solid wide-plank wood floors will inevitably continue to expand and contract after installation. Decreases in humidity in the exposed wear surface can cause cupping (concave curving) as the surface layer dries out. Gaps will appear between the planks as each whole plank dries and shrinks. Increases in moisture content may generate excessive compressive forces around the floor’s perimeter, perhaps even causing the floor to lift in the most stressed areas. Solid wood will always distort.

Engineered Wood

The construction of a properly engineered wide-plank serves to counteract the forces that make wood expand and contract across the direction of the grain. A well-engineered wide-plank should consist of a sandwich-like construction of three layers.

Element7’s premium-engineered planks are more expensive than either non-engineered solid wood planks or less well-engineered variants. There is a good reason for this: their technical supremacy makes them far more stable. Inferior-quality engineered boards include: unbalanced ply-backed veneers (a wood veneer on top of plywood); planks of two- rather than three-layer construction; top and bottom layers of different wood species; variations in the density of the core material; poorly bonded layers; and inadequate quality control in the precision-machining. Such faults compromise the performance of engineered wood and its stability.

The Wide-Plank Benchmark

Element7 is renowned throughout the world for the uncompromising engineering standards of its wide-plank wood flooring range. For instance the core, or inner, layer is softwood (not plywood). It is formed from blocks with alternating and opposing grains (blocked), this layer runs at right angles to the two outer layers. Softwood can withstand considerable bending and distortional forces along its grain and resist any dimensional tendency of the outer layers to change as a result of fluctuations in temperature or humidity. This is a painstaking process, but it is necessary to guarantee resistance to any possible warping effects. The two outer layers are no less important.

A typical money-saving measure employed by some manufacturers involves using an inferior timber for the bottom layer of the sandwich-like board in the mistaken belief that, since it is not visible to the eye, a low-grade material will suffice. Nothing could be further from the truth. The top and bottom layers of the engineered flooring must be of the same wood species and in identical dimensions (balanced): crucially, having the same expansion and contraction characteristics allows any stress or strain forces to be cancelled out through the core layer.

The wood-engineering technique used in the construction of an Element7 wide-plank is internationally recognised as the industry benchmark.